A big part of Sarah Palin's political appeal is her ability to exploit social grievances and cultural symbolism. It was visible during the 2008 campaign when she described parts of the country as "pro-American" and wondered aloud why Barack Obama was "palling around" with domestic terrorists.

In her forthcoming book, "Going Rogue," that capacity is never more evident then when Palin travels to New York for a taping of "Saturday Night Live."

The then-vice presidential candidate writes that she refused to shake Oliver Stone's hand because of the director's leftist political leanings. Stone was in the studio making an SNL appearance of his own.

"During all this, the writers, the producers, and the campaign continued to hammer out the script," Palin writes. "Josh Brolin, Mark Wahlberg, and the singer Adele were also on the show that night, as was director Oliver Stone, who made a cameo appearance. Unbelievably, he is a supporter of Communist dictator Hugo Chavez, who in a 2006 speech to the United Nations referred to the president of the United States as 'the devil himself.' I did not shake Stone's hand."

The anecdote is entirely gratuitous. But it plays right into the conservative psyche. Obama, after all, took stupendous heat for not condemning Chavez after the Venezuelan leader gave him a book.

Palin didn't end with Stone. She also took a swipe at Alec Baldwin -- the "30 Rock" star who is also known for this progressive politics:

Alec Baldwin also guested on the show that evening. The bigwigs haggled back and forth over my appearance with Alec, the writers sending down some lines where Alec was basically supposed to perform a comic dissection on me. Then I was supposed to passively take his arm and stroll offstage.

From a political messaging standpoint, the campaign could see that wasn't going to work. We put our heads together and sent the producers a counteroffer: Alec would still get his barbs in, then I would say, "Hey Baldwin, weren't you supposed to leave the country after the last election?"

Uh... no, producers said.

We tried another idea. It happened that I had recently talked with Alec's brother, Stephen, at a GOP fund-raiser. So we sent back another counteroffer based on my actual conversation with Stephen. "Hey, Alec," the proposed line went, "I saw Stephen at a fund-raiser last week and asked him when he was going to knock some sense into you."

Uh... no.

What's that line about being able to dish it out?

New York Times's columnist David Brooks -- never a huge fan of Sarah Palin -- laced into the former vice presidential candidate on Sunday, calling her a "joke" and a "potential talk show host."

Speaking the day before Palin's new book, "Going Rogue," is slated to be officially released, Brooks scoffed at the notion that the ex-governor was somehow ready to be the face of the GOP.

"She's a joke," he told ABC's "This Week." "I mean, I just can't take her seriously. We have got serious problems in the country. Barack Obama is trying to handle war. We just had a guy elected Virginia governor who is probably the model for future of the Republican Party, Bob McDonnell: Pretty serious guy, pragmatic, calm, kind of boring. The idea that this potential talk show host is considered seriously for the Republican nomination, believe me, it will never happen. Republican primary voters are just not going to elect a talk show host."

Brooks has never been a big Palin believer. Back in October of 2008, he said that Palin "represents a fatal cancer to the Republican Party" and insisted that she was "absolutely not" ready to be president.

On Sunday, Brooks did get a bit of pushback to his Palin skepticism. Speaking right after him on the "This Week" panel, PBS' Gwen Ifill urged her compatriots not to "underestimate the degree to which women will be drawn to her story."

"And that is who she is speaking to," she added. "These are people who are ignored, who nobody counts into their thinking."

If there was any doubt that Senate Republicans are eager to drag their heels when it comes to health care reform, Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) removed it on Sunday.

The Kentucky Republican, during an appearance on "Fox News Sunday," demanded that the Senate take, at the very least, six weeks to deliberate legislation once it is sent to the floor for amendments.

"There will be a lot of amendments over a lot of weeks. The Senate is not the House, you saw in the House there was three votes and it was over in one day," McConnell warned. "This will be on the floor for quite a long time."

Warning that health care reform "cuts Medicare rates, raises taxes and raises insurance premiums," McConnell also insisted that Majority Leader Harry Reid had kept the legislation secret from his colleagues.

"We know it's been in Harry Reid's office for six weeks and the other 99 senators haven't seen it," he said. "I think we ought to at least have as much time for other 99 senators and all of the American people to take a look at this bill as Majority Leader Reid has had."

The strategy for Republicans, McConnell outlined, would be to "delay the process so we fully understand what's in the bill." That means a reform debate that's gone on for roughly nine months could extend to a tenth; if Republicans throw up enough parliamentary hurdles, reform could be delayed into 2010.

"I think it ought to be on the floor as least as long as it was in Harry Reid's office," said McConnell.

Sarah Palin's much-discussed book, "Going Rogue," hasn't even been officially released yet and already its accuracy is in question.

The Huffington Post has obtained internal McCain campaign emails -- addressed to and by the former vice presidential candidate -- that directly contradict or cast serious doubt on several of Palin's assertions. The emails were passed along by a mid-level staffer who called early excerpts of "Going Rogue", a serious mixing of truth and imagination."

In one email thread, dated October 14, 2008, Palin says she is "not thrilled" with the idea of going on Saturday Night Live as a way of marginalizing the show's unflattering impersonations of her.

"Not after seeing clips of what they've been playing re: my family," Palin writes to campaign manager Steve Schmidt, as well as top strategists Rick Davis; and Nicolle Wallace. "I had no idea how gross 'celebrities' on that show and in other celebrity venues could get when it comes to family and other aspects of my life that have nothing to do with seeking the vp slot. These folks are whack - didn't know it was as bad as it is... what's the upside in giving them any celebrity venue a ratings boost? That's Todd's input also," she concludes, in reference to her husband.

Schmidt would respond minutes later, telling Palin that, "if you don't want to do it you should not," while adding that a guest appearance would "get an enormous amount of" attention and help her "to fly above all this."

"The american people will see someone who can laugh at themselves which has alwauys [sic] been a trait they admire," he adds.

CLICK TO READ EMAIL

Palin would ultimately make a guest appearance on Saturday Night Live days later. But in her upcoming book she describes the deliberations about whether or not to go on the show much differently than the emails suggest. In "Going Rogue", the vice presidential candidate writes that "from the beginning, I liked the idea that John and I might appear on the show."

"Let's do this," I said. "Let's go on and neutralize some of this, and have some fun!"

Of course, the idea was met with massive back-and-forth haggling. Had we done it back in September, I think we might have had a shot at evening the odds with the SNL crew. As it stood, though, Tina's impression of me became so omnipresent--and so unchallenged--that some people blurred SNL/skit dialogue with what I had actually said."

The SNL episode isn't the only instance where "Going Rogue" seems to venture away from documented campaign material. On the condition that it could be quoted but not re-published, the McCain staffer also provided the email that Schmidt sent to Palin and her staff after she was prank called by someone pretending to be French President Nicolas Sarkozy

"Who set this up? Are you kidding me? Did it occur to anyone that the french president wouldn't be looking to have a conversation with the vicepresidential candidate 3 days before the election," Schmidt writes. "From this moment forward, no interview occurs without my direct signoff. Nothing. I want to know the exact details of this. I want to know who is responsible."

In "Going Rogue", the anecdote is painted in a drastically different setting and context. For starters, Palin writes that Schmidt called her, something that two McCain aides (including the one who provided the email) insist never happened. "He never called screaming at her," said one of the aides, who was traveling with Palin at the time. "There was no phone call."

Moreover, in Going Rogue, Palin recalls Schmidt screaming directly at her, so much so that it "blew my hair back." In actuality, the irritation was directed at the staffers, the aide said. "He was expressing his anger to staff. And did it over email."

Finally, the McCain aide sends over a third email that shows a late-in-the-campaign Palin grateful for the work done by Schmidt and others and cognizant of her "blundered-up" media appearances. The occasion was a sit-down interview that the vice presidential candidate had done with ABC's Elizabeth Vargas on October 29, in which it was reported (widely out of context) that Palin was already thinking about running for president in 2012.

"I am very sorry," Palin writes to Nicolle Wallace, Steve Schmidt, and Rick Davis, with her husband, Todd, cc:ed. "u guys are working double-triple time on this blundered-up stuff that they spin bc of my visits w press - while I apologize I say I love you guys!!!"

CLICK TO READ EMAIL

All told, the three emails provided to the Huffington Post are the clearest contradictions yet of the account of the campaign that Palin painted in her book. Far from being eager to go on SNL, Palin - according to the emails - showed trepidation. Meanwhile, Schmidt, in the aftermath of the Sarkozy gaffe, doesn't direct his anger to Palin over the phone. But rather, according to two aides, at staffers via email. And while Palin goes to great lengths in "Going Rogue" to paint the McCain campaign manager as tempermental and constantly opposed to allowing her to play a bigger role on the trail; just days before the election she was expressing her "love" for the help he had done covering up her blunders.

Reflecting on it all, the campaign aide who provided the emails said the following of the book: "There are elements of truth underlying a narrative that is completely false."

In a parting shot at Fox News, White House Communications Director Anita Dunn mocked the conservative-leaning network on Friday and laughed off its controversial host Glenn Beck for calling her a Mao enthusiast.

The outgoing administration spokeswoman took a clear and enjoyable dig, first at Sean Hannity for recently airing spliced footage designed to make a crowd of anti-health care protesters seem bigger than reality.

"A fun fact from this week is that an opinion show on a certain news network was using edited footage to make it appear that a rally last week, and political opposition to the president, was much larger than it appeared," said Dunn, during her appearance at the Bloomberg News Washington Summit. "Some of you may have heard about it. The people who went in and did fact checking on that, and actually exposed the spliced edited was... Jon Stewart of the 'Daily Show' on Comedy Central. Well that is where you are getting fact-checking and investigative journalism these days folks. It is a different media environment."

Showing an even greater appreciation for the "Daily Show"'s Fox News fact-checking abilities, Dunn referenced another Stewart triumph later in her question-and-answer session.

"Jon Stewart actually did one of the most amazing pieces of journalism last week or a couple of weeks ago," she said, "in which he looked at the way Fox, on their opinion shows, raises some issue that then gets reported on by their news division as 'a controversy.' ... Now, that's a point of view. That's fine. That's entertainment. It helps their ratings. But I think if you go downstairs and walk through the Newseum that's not traditionally what you think of as traditional news -- to some extent inventing the story."

Approached in the halls outside the forum, the Huffington Post asked Dunn to put Glenn Beck's recent theatrics into the context of her critiques of Fox News's coverage. She chuckled. For the past few weeks, Beck has insisted that the outgoing communications director considers Mao Zedong a political hero and has put a red telephone on his set begging for her to call and explain her political dispositions.

"I think it was news to everybody who knows me," she replied. "You know, most media consultants usually are accused of other things, but that's not one of them."

Last month, Dunn got caught up in a war of words between the White House and Fox News when she made the rather bland observation that the network carries a Republican agenda. On Friday, she was asked whether she considered MSNBC to have a counter-balancing bias -- a common retort offered by Fox's defenders. Dunn replied by noting that for three hours every morning that network handed over its programming to "a former Republican congressman who was a member of Newt Gingrich's revolution": Joe Scarborough.

Elsewhere in her remarks, Dunn acknowledged that her decision to go after Fox News was not an example of her "going rogue." White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel, Press Secretary Robert Gibbs and perhaps even the president himself gave her the green light. She also mocked Fox for proclaiming that it had secured an exclusive sit-down interview with President Obama during his trip to Asia when, in actuality, it was simply part of a rotating pool of reporters.

"We have on past foreign trips done what are called round-robins where there are short interviews with all of the networks that travel with us," she said. "We have not made a decision network on whether or not we are going to do those. There are no confirmed television interviews in china. And if, oh, some network sent out a press release announcing that was going to happen you'd have to ask about that network and whether or not they really had their facts confirmed before they leaked that."

Attorney General Eric Holder said Friday that he was surprised by the resignation of White House Counsel Greg Craig and believes Craig has been unfairly blamed for the administration's difficulties in closing the prison base at Guantanamo Bay.

Briefing reporters at the Department of Justice, Holder called Craig a "great lawyer" who had "contributed in a significant way to the success of this administration." On the issue of shutting down Gitmo -- a project that Craig spearheaded within the administration, but which has stalled in Congress -- the AG insisted that it was wrong to scapegoat one person.

"Greg is a friend of mine," he said, "and those who have tried to place on him, I think, an unfair proportion of the blame as to why things have not proceeded, perhaps as we've wanted, with respect to Guantanamo, that is simply unfair."

Craig's departure from the White House on Friday was long anticipated. Inside the administration, there was a growing frustration over what aides considered a botched political process, which was Craig's responsibility. Those who know Craig personally, meanwhile, say he felt increasingly frustrated with his role within the administration. He had, initially, wanted to be part of the White House's foreign policy apparatus.

The push to close Guantanamo has met various pitfalls since it became a stated administrative objective, with Congress balking at the prospect of bringing detainees to domestic prison facilities. And now, it is widely assumed that the one-year deadline for shutting the detention center will be missed.

"I think it is going to be difficult to close that facility by January the 22nd," Holder told reporters on Friday. "There are a number of things that I think are most problematic."

(Updated with response from Dodd's office; see below.)

One of the president's top economic advisers expressed concerns Friday that financial regulatory reforms proposed by Sen. Chris Dodd (D-Conn.) would take too long to become operational and would in some respects be ineffective.

Austan Goolsbee, who sits on the White House's Council of Economic Advisers, said he felt some "nervousness" about Dodd's proposal to create a committee independent of the Federal Reserve to oversee risks in the financial system and police potential threats to the economy.

"The administration's view is that systemic institutions ought to be governed by the Fed," Goolsbee said. A different group could be charged with looking at problems on the horizon, "The Dodd version is 'let's combine both of those and create some new agency,'" he said. "I am a little worried that to create that new agency would take a long time and by the time you got to that we are back into this world."

Speaking at Bloomberg News's Washington Summit, Goolsbee compared Dodd's blueprint for financial regulation to the type of system seen in England, then noted that "they have a lot of problems in the U.K. as well." The chief concern, Goolsbee stressed, was to have strong coordination within a regulatory body. Splitting up functions -- as the Dodd bill proposes -- could, he predicted, lead to missed warning signs or bureaucratic mishaps.

"There has always been an issue that in a moment of crisis, where the Fed is out there trying to figure out what to do, if they are not integrally involved with the actual regulation and oversight of the institutions, you can, if you do it wrong, get into a left hand doesn't know what the right hand is doing crisis," Goolsbee said.

Dodd, who chairs the Senate Banking Committee, has put forward what is regarded as the most aggressive of the three official proposals for re-regulating the markets. The senator has called for overhauling the existing regulatory establishment -- in part by removing powers from the Fed and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. and creating three new agencies to oversee the financial system, protect consumers, and anticipate future crises. Dodd's proposals have, however, come under attack from industry groups, and House leaders have, as The Washington Post put it, found parts of the proposal "untenable." One of the concerns from the administration is that the Dodd plan is simply too sweeping and ambitious to make it through Congress.

UPDATE:

Kirstin Brost, a spokesman for Dodd on the Senate Banking Committee, emailed the Huffington Post taking umbrage with various of Goolsbee's assertions.

Where Goolsbee suggested that regulatory functions would best be housed under one roof -- the Federal Reserve's -- Brost notes that, "giving the Federal Reserve too many responsibilities led to missed warning signs" in the first place.

In regards to his comparison of the regulatory framework under Dodd's plan to that in the U.K., Brost writes: "The last thing we would want would be to set up a UK style regulator. The FSA in the UK merges regulations for banks, securities, insurance, and consumer protections into one agency. Dodd's proposal does the opposite. The crisis taught us that when an agency has too many responsibilities it won't do any of them well. Dodd's bill creates a single bank regulator, a consumer financial protection agency, and a systemic risk regulator and also preserves the SEC, FDIC, CFTC, NCUA, 50 state bank regulators, and 50 state insurance commissioners."

Finally, Brost pushes back on Goolsbee's suggestion that if you remove responsibilities from the Fed, you could create a system where information is not shared between agencies and crises are missed.

"We keep the Federal Reserve integrally involved with a seat on the boards of the FDIC, the single prudential bank regulator, and the systemic risk regulator," she writes. "Dodd's proposal will ensure that the Fed has the ability to get whatever information they need from banks and other regulators in order to do their job on monetary policy and as lender of last resort.

"Dodd wants to focus and strengthen the Federal Reserve's ability to do their core functions - monetary policy, lender of last resort, and payment systems supervision."

The CEO of one of the biggest pharmaceutical companies in the country said on Friday that he and others in the industry would switch their support for health care reform to opposition if Congress settles on legislation passed by the House of Representatives.

David Brennan, head of pharma giant AstraZeneca, told the Huffington Post that he was pleased with the White House and the Senate Finance Committee for standing by "the principles which we said are really important." The three parties entered into an agreement, before the health care debate heated up, that saw the pharmaceutical industry committing $80 billion to reform in exchange for various assurances -- the primary one being that the government would not use its purchasing power to negotiate cheaper prescription drug prices.

The House, however, hasn't played by those rules. And in an appearance at Bloomberg News's Washington Summitt, Brennan warned that the industry's ample resources could be turned against the broader reform effort if Speaker Nancy Pelosi's legislation were to emerge from the Congress.

"Right now the answer to that is yes," Brennan said, when asked if the support would change to opposition. "We said there were principles we didn't want to see violated. And if those principles -- price controls, Medicare rebates, moving dual eligibles back from Medicare and back into the Medicaid discount program -- if those things happen, I can't see how we could be supportive of the program."

Asked after the conference by the Huffington Post what kind of opposition he was discussing, Brennan refused to reveal his cards.

"We said we are not in favor of the House bill but we haven't seen what they are going to try to reconcile," he said. "We are going to do what we are going to do. Right now we are in support [of the process] because there are certain things we are trying to get into the system which we think make it a better outcome."

Part of that "better outcome" entails the potential for major profits for the pharmaceutical industry. According to an analysis put together by the pharmaceutical research firm, IMS, the industry stands to gain an estimated $137 billion from an improved economy, new market innovations, as well as the deal struck by with the White House and Senate Finance Committee.

And yet, when Brennan was asked whether Big Pharma stood to make profits going forward, he said no.

"Until we really see the elements of a health care bill come through... it is difficult to project," he said. "But right now it is not obvious to me that there is an upside to this."

Asked to reconcile his dour outlook with the IMS data, Brennan replied: "I talk to the IMS. They, I think, have gone from projecting the market would be flat to roughly two or three percent. I think you have to go back and look at their record of prospectively being able to project that out. And right now the market is softer than we probably expected it to be a few years ago."

One of the Republican Party's most respected and relied-upon consultants has serious reservations about two the party's biggest names.

Alex Castellanos, a conservative media strategist and regular presence on CNN, raised questions of Sarah Palin's viability for office and took major swipes at Florida Senate candidate Charlie Crist during an appearance at Bloomberg News' Washington Summit Thursday.

The harshest lines were saved for Crist, who Castellanos said was not really a Republican.

"Nobody is running out the Charlie Crists of the world," Castellanos said, when asked about the shrinking GOP tent. "Look, if Barack Obama stood up tomorrow in the Democratic Party and said: 'I got a great idea. George Bush's tax cuts. They are terrific. They are the best thing ever. I'm for that.' What do you think would happen to him in the Democratic Party? He would have stepped out of the mainstream of the Democratic Party at that point. Charlie Crist happens to be the guy who stepped out of the mainstream of the Republican Party."

"The Republicans are actually very unified at this point," Castellanos added. "You see it, recently, in Florida, where the fella who is out of the mainstream is one guy. It happens to be the governor, unfortunately for him. But Marco Rubio [Crist's challenger for the Senate seat] and every Republican in the state doesn't quite understand why... the governor there voted to support this huge stimulus."

Crist, of course, never voted for the stimulus bill. He merely expressed appreciation for the help the president was providing his state. For that acknowledgment, he has been branded a heretic within the GOP. As for the Bush tax cuts, despite Castellanos' assertion, a dozen Senate Democrats did support the measure and none were seriously punished for it.

But Castellanos wasn't done throwing haymakers at fellow Republicans. Asked if former Gov. Sarah Palin, about to embark on a book tour, was she the future of the GOP, Castellanos was skeptical.

"[She's a] fascinating character and that is what the news loves to play," Castellanos observed. "I think [Obama] is stopping by Alaska as he begins this week-long trip to Asia. I don't think he is going to announce that he is resigning from politics," he said, in reference to Palin's abrupt resignation from office.

"I think it is going to be very tough for Sarah Palin, who has stepped back from the governorship under the explanation that her state would be better off without her, to now explain why the other 49 states would somehow be better off with her," he concluded.

A Goldman Sachs analysis of health care legislation has concluded that, as far as the bottom line for insurance companies is concerned, the best thing to do is nothing. A close second would be passing a watered-down version of the Senate Finance Committee's bill.

A study put together by Goldman in mid-October looks at the estimated stock performance of the private insurance industry under four variations of reform legislation. The study focused on the five biggest insurers whose shares are traded on Wall Street: Aetna, UnitedHealth, WellPoint, CIGNA and Humana.

The Senate Finance Committee bill, which Goldman's analysts conclude is the version most likely to survive the legislative process, is described as the "base" scenario. Under that legislation (which did not include a public plan) the earnings per share for the top five insurers would grow an estimated five percent from 2010 through 2019. And yet, the "variance with current valuation" -- essentially, what the value of the stock is on the market -- is projected to drop four percent.

Things are much worse, Goldman estimates, for legislation that resembles what was considered and (to a certain extent) passed by the House of Representatives. This is, the firm deems, the "bear case" scenario -- in which earnings per share for the top five insurers would decline an estimated one percent from 2010 through 2019 and the variance with current valuation is projected to be negative 36 percent.

What the firm sees as the best path forward for the private insurance industry's bottom line is, to be blunt, inaction.

The study's authors advise that if no reform is passed, earnings per share would grow an estimated ten percent from 2010 through 2019, and the value of the stock would rise an estimated 59 percent during that time period.

The next best thing for the insurance industry would be if the legislation passed by the Senate Finance Committee is watered down significantly. Described as a "bull case" scenario -- in which there is "moderation of provisions in the current SFC plan" or "changes prior to the major implementation in 2013" -- earnings per share for the five biggest insurers would grow an estimated ten percent and the variance with current valuation would rise an estimated 47 percent.

The report, a Goldman official stressed, was analytic not advocacy-based. Their job was to provide a sober assessment of the market realities facing private insurers under various versions of health care reform.

"If no reform at all happens you would see the largest rise in EPS," a Goldman official acknowledged. "But what we are doing is just analyzing what the stocks would do under different scenarios."

The study does note on the front page that the firm "does and seeks to do business with companies covered in its research reports." Those companies include Aetna, Wells Point and United Health.

In the context of the current health care debate, the findings provide a small window into the concerns that have driven the private insurance industry's opposition to reform legislation. Simply put: health care reform is going to hurt their bottom line. No less a prestigious voice than Goldman Sachs is telling them so.

Some insurers, in the end, will be hit harder than others. CIGNA is the lowest of the big five, for instance, because it does little business providing insurance plans to Medicare patients, individuals and families buying health plans directly, or small employers that offer health plans to their workers.

In addition, some reforms are going to hurt the industry more than others. Regulatory changes -- such as prohibiting the prejudice against consumers with pre-existing conditions -- will have an impact across the board, as will the funding cuts to Medicare Advantage.

Overall, Goldman calculates the probability of reform passing Congress at 75 percent. Though the limitations of Goldman's political prognostications were on full display earlier in the document:

By mid-late October, we expect a cloture vote (60 votes) to bypass a potential filibuster followed by several weeks of debate over proposed amendments on the Senate floor (with a similar process under way in the House). If both the Senate and House are able to pass legislation (perhaps before the Thanksgiving recess), a House-Senate conference negotiation should produce combined legislation for final approval (perhaps by mid-December).

Rep. Marsha Blackburn, one of the most prominent flamethrowers in the House of Representatives, simply could not commit herself on Thursday to no longer call President Obama a socialist or a tyrant.

Appearing at the Bloomberg Washington Summit, the Tennessee Republican was asked whether she disapproved of some of the more vitriolic rhetoric heard at conservative town-hall or tea-party protests.

"I think many of us would appreciate having a more civil tone here in Washington," Blackburn responded. "And what we would love to see is less partisanship; and individuals coming to the table and sitting down and working in a bipartisan manner. That is one of the items that has been so frustrating in dealing with the health care bill."

Nice dodge. Gary Flake, an employee of Microsoft and the person who posed the question, kept at it. Will you, he asked, "no longer endorse the words and language of socialism and evil and tyranny and things like that."

"What I will tell you --" Blackburn replied, carefully choosing her words.

"-- Is a crisp answer?" chimed in Flake.

"What I will be happy to tell you is that the American people are very frustrated," replied Blackburn, getting a big flummoxed. "And what I can speak to is for me. And what I think to do is to represent my constituents in ways that are going to honor the fact that they have elected me and that they have sent me here. They want to see action... They are frustrated with Washington D.C. as a whole. And what we need to do is make certain that we as representatives coming here are able to sit down and work on these issues and work these problems out."

With that, the interview ended. Unbeknown to both parties at the time was that a local official from Blackburn's home state had just thrown another rhetorical haymaker at the White House. Rep. Richard Floyd, a Republican member of the Tennessee House of Representatives, blasted out an email on Thursday afternoon warning about "what socialist leader Obama and his gang of thugs are trying to do to this country." Floyd was worried, for some odd reason, that Obama was trying to take away people's firearms.

Bloomberg News scored a major opportunity when news broke Wednesday evening that (1) President Obama had scrapped four proposals for operations in Afghanistan; and (2) the U.S. ambassador to that country had expressed deep reservations about a troop build-up.

The news outlet was, on Thursday, hosting a Washington summit. And its featured guest was General David Petraeus, head of the United States Central Command and, perhaps, the most highly-respected voice in the armed forces.

So which topic was the center of discussion? It was, in the end, topic (3): None of the above.

For 30 minutes, Petraeus was asked about a host of policy issues not by a reporter, but by Michael O'Hanlon, a prominent war cheerleader and fellow at the Brookings Institution. The issues covered were surely substantive -- ranging from U.S. commitments to Pakistan, the ability to sustain security achievements in Iraq and the difficulties posed by Iran. But never once was the issue of the day broached.

The closest O'Hanlon came was when, at the very beginning of the session, he asked Petraeus whether he thought the template for counterinsurgency in Iraq was transferable to Afghanistan. It was the same question Petraeus fielded the last time he appeared at a forum at the Newseum in Washington D.C.: The Atlantic's First Draft of History Conference on the first of October.

For the next half hour, the task of quizzing Petraeus was turned over to the crowd, and the questions offered ventured even further into the obscure. At one point, the general discussed the military's policy toward Somali pirate ships for roughly ten minutes. Halfway in, it seemed like a breakthrough could happen. A reporter from U.S. News and World Report was able to get her hand on a microphone. But before she could get through her own introduction she was asked to pass the mic along after it was explained that the inquiries were to be saved primarily for the audience and a trade publication reporter had asked the previous question.

Finally, the spotlight came back to O'Hanlon, who on various occasions during the forum had expressed the appreciation and friendship he felt for Petraeus. His last query, however, returned to the issue of Pakistan -- certainly a worthwhile topic but not, necessarily, THE topic. The hour ended without one question on the White House strategy sessions taking place on Afghanistan or the concerns raised by Amb. Karl Eikenberry, who in classified cables revealed the night before, had expressed misgivings about sending additional forces into war.

Leaving the stage, the Huffington Post was able to track Petraeus down. But by then he was in the clear and making a quick dash for the exit.

"Are you comfortable with the president's decision to continue deliberations on Afghanistan?" I asked.

"I'm sorry I'm not taking any questions about that," he replied.

Indeed, he wasn't.

One of the most powerful labor leaders in the country said on Thursday that Democrats were unable to hold the governor's chair in Virginia and may lose seats nationally because of a lack of truly populist principles.

Richard Trumka, president of the AFL-CIO, told a summit in Washington D.C. that without improvements in the job market, elected officials -- including the Democratic majority in Congress -- would likely flounder in 2010.

"I don't think we should feel comfortable with what's going on for several reasons," Trumka said, when asked about the current status of economic growth. "One: even though you may see some green sprouts right now as far as the economy, until jobs are starting to be created it means nothing..."

The union leader saved his toughest political analysis, however, for a candidate that his institution endorsed. Former gubernatorial aspirant Creigh Deeds lost the race for Virginia governor because he declined to promote progressive policy points, said Trumka.

"Creigh Deeds said he would opt-out of the public option, which certainly depressed his base," said Trumka. "He was against giving workers greater collective bargaining rights."

"He really didn't define himself in a way that people wanted to hear. People want to hear about jobs. They want to hear about how you will create jobs."

Pressed if a winning electoral message was a populist one, Trumka replied: "If you look at the last election that's exactly what's happened. The populist message is everything."

The man known as President Obama's "czar" of CEO pay, Kenneth Feinberg, said on Thursday that he finds the title "unfortunate" and believes that the criticism he is getting from both sides of the compensation debate means he must be doing his job right.

Speaking at the Bloomberg Washington Summit, Feinberg beat back questions about the power he wields and role he's played in limiting CEO pay at seven institutions dependent on government bailout funds.

"I must say, this czar characterization is very unfortunate," he said at one point, when asked what he could do about corporate governance -- something not under his domain. "I really am not eager to use imperial edicts. I would rather cooperate with these companies. And they've been very cooperative."

His goal is to implement a policy authorized by Congress, based on respecting the need to keep these institutions "thriving" while simultaneously getting the taxpayers money back, he said. The fact that some people feel he's gone too far and others are hungry for more, he said, indicates that "maybe I've struck the right balance."

In late October, Feinberg ordered a 90 percent cut in average salaries for the top 25 executives at Bank of America Corp., American International Group Inc., Citigroup Inc., General Motors, GMAC, Chrysler and Chrysler Financial.

"There was no vindictiveness in my decision," Feinberg explained. "There was no revenge. It was strictly: Here is the statue, here are the accompanying regulations, here is the Congress watching... and here is what I think, in my assessment, will keep these companies thriving."

Asked whether he thought his purview -- which consists only of those institutions still dependent on taxpayer funds -- is too limited, Feinberg replied:

"I have no jurisdiction over nor should I have over these other Wall Street firms. I hope that the recommendations that are made on compensation -- particularly the structure -- will be voluntarily adopted by Wall Street firms and other companies... But that's up to them."

The position of pay czar -- if you will -- was established earlier this year when Congress amended the language of the TARP legislation to ensure that a situation similar to AIG's issuance of exorbitant bonuses did not happen again. Feinberg, a protege of former U.S. Senator Ted Kennedy, took over the post as part of pro-bono work.

It is, in many ways, a no-win situation, with those angry at Wall Street's excesses demanding stiff punishments and devotees of the capitalist system decrying the heavy government hand.

"I must say," Feinberg acknowledged, "you cannot help but be sensitive to the political realities. What good is it to render decisions if they will be so vilified and criticized by Congress that the very companies that you want to thrive are placed in jeopardy?"

A prominent South Carolina conservative offered support for Senator Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) on Wednesday after a local Republican party censured the senator for working with Democrats.

Katon Dawson, the former state party chair, and a recent candidate for Republican National Committee chairman, said that while he understands the anger felt by Charleston County Republicans, Graham was just, well, being Graham.

"What has the base so upset was that any time you partner up with a Hillary Clinton and John Kerry or, god bless him, Ted Kennedy, you have a problem on your hands," Dawson told the Huffington Post. "But I know Lindsey. He is cagey and crafty. People forget that he grew up in the back of a pool hall and that his daddy sold liquor. People forget that.

"There is a price to pay back home when you partner with John Kerry," Dawson added. "There is a price you pay when you have photo ops with Hillary Clinton. But Lindsey has always been willing to pay that price."

"I understand both sides," he said. "I truly do."

Dawson's defense, however qualified, certainly will be welcomed by the Graham camp. On Wednesday, the senator found himself censured by the local party for weakening the Republican brand.

Dawson, who is a decidedly conservative figure inside party ranks, reminded local officials that -- for all his bipartisan mushiness -- Graham had actually secured some important policy victories.

"At the end of the day what we are looking for is offshore drilling for natural gas and Lindsey got that in the bill," said Dawson of the climate legislation being considered.

The former party chair also noted that Graham's work brokering a compromise to maintain the filibuster in the Senate (which was much bemoaned by conservatives when it happened in 2005) now seemed downright prescient.

"I give Lindsey his due," Dawson said. "He said, 'Guys, let me tell you, we aren't always going to be in charge and we will be real sorry if we change these rules.' And he was right."

Memories in conservative circles are short, however. And Graham currently is a target of choice for much of the tea-party crowd.

Graham's best friend in the Senate is John McCain, another Republican pol who took a bit of pride in rankling his own party's leadership.

"We have two U.S Senators in South Carolina who will balance each other out. We have Jim DeMint who will always be a conservative," said Dawson. "And we have Lindsey. Lindsey marches to the beat of a different drum. He is of the McCain camp variety for sure.

"If you look under the dictionary, 'South Carolina Maverick' there is Lindsey's picture," Dawson added. "Lindsey is from a state where center right is not a comfortable place to be but I understand what he is saying."